The impact of language learning on wider academic outcomes

Much is claimed about the benefits of being bilingual. From improving executive function, through promoting inter-cultural understanding, to mitigating the effects of aging on cognitive decline, bilingualism is framed as something of a panacea for the human condition. In the field of foreign language education, related research has, quite understandably, focused on the implications of being bilingual on the teaching and learning of a foreign language itself. Little of this body of research has expanded its purview to explore the causal implications that learning a foreign language (as opposed to already knowing one) may have in terms of the benefits observed in the bilingualism research. In this chapter, we explore the small body of work that speaks to whether and to what extent knowing more than one language can impact on outcomes like academic achievement, literacy, metalinguistic awareness, employment opportunities, and so on. We identify some of the methodological issues that make interpreting work of this type problematic, and we set forth a research agenda to more rigorously address this important area of inquiry. We conclude by arguing in support of a more prominent position for foreign languages in the primary classroom, but temper this with a caveat to the research community that we need more systematic and rigorous research about the effects of foreign language learning if we are to bring the rest of society along with us